26'8 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Terms : Sl.OO Per A.nn\ini. 



[Including Postage.1 

 For Club Bates see Last Page. 



IwIE3DI3Sr-A., -^TJG- 1, IST'T'. 



But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which 

 believe in me, it were better for him that a millhtone 

 were hanged about his neck, and thai he were 

 drowned in the depth ol the sea. ipic: Mathew; IS, 6. 



See our new price list on fda. ; 45 to 55c. per pound. 



Friend Boardman, of Huron, O.. has sent us a sec- 

 tion containing a single comb of honey, four and one- 

 fourth inches through, and we have sent him the §5 

 with the condition that he shall give it up when some 

 one does better. The honey must be sealed, and must 

 be shipped safely to us. 



And now it transpires that we can use fdn. for a 

 natural swarm without any old combs after all. We 

 liave furnished hives for new swarms in that way, 

 and prettier combs were never before seen in our 

 apiary ; every one of the ten are gems of beauty, and 

 we have yet to see a single poor one made in that 

 manner. If there are bees enough to fill the hive, 

 they all "grow" about alike, and our swarm is about 

 as far ahead in 3 days as it would be in a couple of 

 weeks, if put into an empty hive. 



m i w »^ 



MEDINA COUNTY HONEY CROP. 



Our neighbor Shane has taken his usual 5.000 lbs. 

 extracted lioney and sold it to Muth for 10c. Says if 

 he is sure of lOo. he would never want to bother with 

 comb honey, even if he could get '20c. for the latter. 

 Mr. Rice has taken 3,000 which he is selling for 13c. in 

 100 lb. tin cans, to dealers in his vicinity. His tin cans 

 have a ne.at bail for carrying and cost him Si each. 

 ' Shaw & Son have 2,500 extracted. Dean about the 

 same, besides 1,200 in section boxes. Blakeslee about 

 1,000 in small sections. Our own apiary has since May 

 1st (75 colonies) furnished bees and queens to the 

 amount of S300, comb honey $250, besides increasing 

 to 118 full colonies and nuclei. 



I WISH it were possible, my Iriends, to be prompt in 

 everything, and to foresee just what there may be a 

 great demand for. With the exception of honey 

 knives and queens, I believe everytliing has been sent 

 j)romDtly this season ; the former was occasioned by a 

 very inopportune breakdown at the factory, and al- 

 jihough every customer was at once notified, we had 

 some rather unkind letters in regard to the matter. 

 To avoid a similar mishap on such a great staple, 

 again, we have been to the expense of a stock that 

 will probably last all of next season. The orders for 

 <iueens have been such that we had no sort of an al- 

 ternative but to get everybody we knew we could rely 

 on, to help us out. Shaw, Dean and Blakeslee w6re 

 very soon "swamped," and Dr. Brown, Vauglin. Cary 

 and others soon had to tell us to hold on also. Nel.lis 

 bid fair for a time to be a "solid rock," but when we 

 began to pour in the orders at the rate of towards a 

 hundred a week, \\<i too cried "hold on." Now under 

 such a pressure we sometimes sent to those who filled 

 the orders at once, and others would return orders 

 saying they could not fill them, etc., and so without 

 Its being really our fault, one of you might be delayed 

 a long tlnn, while your neighbor got his queens 

 promptly. I have tried to accommodate, even to pay- 

 ing 81.00 for ((ueens that 1 only received a dollar for, 

 yet I know I have tried your patience many times 

 sorely. Will you not excuse It ? Next season^— no, I 

 win not promise, but will try to have "S gross" of 



queens on hand, as well as honey knives. I do wIsIj 

 we could get up the latter as safely and surely as we 

 can the former. Shaw, Dean and all the rest have re- 

 covered from the shock, and are now 1b front aJ 

 work ; send on your orders. 



I. have used some 30 lbs. tdn. this season, purchased of 

 Mr. J. H. Nellis and it works to a charm, it is a perfect 

 success. I find that m,v queens lay in it readWy ; in manv 

 cases I have found them laying in it in 24» hours after put- 

 ting it in the hive. I think they use it full as readily as 

 the new natural comb. It k well known that queens 

 will shnn new (natnral) comb as long as there is room for 

 them m old comb, but not so with fdii. Those who have 

 pronounced it a failure did not know how to use it, or 

 else they did not hare pure wax fdn. 



A. E. Manfm, Bristol, Vt., June 29tb, 1877. 



SAPE AND EOCKY MOUNTAIN BEE PLANT. 



I consider rape a orofitable crop to raise for honey. I 

 sowed some last season for m.v bees and was so well 

 pleased with the result that I have sowed five acres this 

 season. It usually comes into bloom immediately after 

 the basswood season is over. While in Ohio I visited 

 your friend Rice of Westfield, and he gave me some seed 

 of the Rocky Mountain bee yi\iint (Polinisia piirpiirea). 

 By the way, I have seen hundreds of acres of it in the 

 Rocky Mountains. I sent it home with directions for 

 sowing. It comes into bloom after rape. I think I never 

 saw bees work so industriously on any one kind of blos- 

 som as this, while in bloom, and it blooms equally as long 

 as white clover. I have sowed quite a large piece thi* 

 season from which I shall be better able to judge of the 

 quality of. the honey it produces. 



L. W. Stuabt, Monmouth, Iowa, July 4th, 1877. . 



CHAFF HIVES. 



The chaff hives are especially suited to summer use. 

 The bees neither hang out nor swarm, as they do in com- 

 mon liives and so far as we have tried them, the chaff 

 seems about as important in summer as in winter, and it 

 will doubtless prove of great benefit in the South, as well 

 as in our localit.y. We have mentioned a fourth swarm of 

 hybrids that was put oa six combs, in one of them, last 

 fall ; this colony seemed to build up all winter and scarce- 

 ly a dead bee was seen at the entrance, or in the hive. 

 They have at this date furnished 75 beautiful sections, 

 which have been taken from the hive and sold, and as 

 man.v more are now in process of filling. They work ear- 

 lier and later than colonies in common hives, and are to 

 be seen coming in loaded during weather so cool that the 

 other bees are hardly out at all. One hundred colonies of 

 bees like these, would afford a very good iacome, and I 

 can see nothing to prevent one man, or even one woman, 

 from taking entire charge of them. After the hives are 

 once located, there is no lifting at all to be done, aside 

 from the frames and sections for there is no upper stor.v 

 to take off, and new swarms can be readily carried to fcbe 

 new hives ; as the cases of sections weigh only about 50 

 lbs., a woman could easily C!irr.v them to a platform at 

 one side of the apiary, where they could be convenientl.v 

 loaded into a wagon. After we are once started, all that 

 is to be carried into the apiary, is these cases of empt.v 

 sections, and all that is to be carried out, is the cases of 

 filled sections. The entire wintering preparation, consists 

 in removing the frames of unfilled sections, and putting 

 in their place the thick chaff cushions. Nothing more is 

 to be done to them until the.v are ready for the same 

 frames of sections again the following season. Every col- 

 ony that has workf d in sections will be amply provisioned 

 for winter, as a general thing, without any kind of "tink- 

 ering," if they have the whole lower 10 frames. The 

 frames of empty sections ean be very conveniently kept 

 over winter in Simplicity hives placed one over the other. 

 In this way they may be stored very compactly, and are 

 secure from miee and insects until wanted. There is ri6 

 need at all of uncapping and removing the partly filled 

 sections. If any of them contain dark fall honey, set 

 them on hives the next season a little before new honey 

 comes in; the bees will uncap and take it all down for 

 brood rearing, and the old comb will be fixed exactly as 

 good as new, as soon as the new honey begins to come iu- 

 If the sections are left on the hives until rather cool 

 weather in the fall, there will be no trouble with 'the 

 moth worms in them, but if taken off in warm July or 

 August weather, they may make considerable trouble. 

 1 do not know of an.y simpler way of getting comb honey, 

 than with tlie chaff hives as given above. If you use the 

 tin separators you will never have any brood in thesfe 

 small sections, "nor any combs built crosswise to hinder 

 and delay your work. The broad upper story containing 

 80 sections, spems to be just what is wanted to prevent 

 swarming. 



